Ideas matter: the intellectual bankruptcy of the precautionary principle

This article is overtly taking a swipe at liberals, but it fails to note the underlying issue, which is that the precautionary principle is epistemologically wrong*; it is a horrible way to think. (It’s not really thinking at all.) Since ideas matter – they drive action – if the precautionary principle is a bad way to think, then application of the precautionary principle is bound to lead to stupid actions. And it does (that’s what the article is about: the stupid things that parents do to “protect” their children).

-JD Cross

The precautionary principle is anti-science and anti-reason. The burden of proof must be placed on he who asserts something to be. Implicit in that statement is the idea that that which is asserted is positive, not negative. So, for example, you would make and try to prove statement A, not statement B.